


Not Language But A Map

by Vicepresidents



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-17
Updated: 2013-07-17
Packaged: 2017-12-20 11:40:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 679
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/886846
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vicepresidents/pseuds/Vicepresidents
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Zayn never realizes he’s doing it, not until he hears the tap tap of the tip of his biro against his fingernails, not until he ducks his head and finds a napkin or the back of a receipt, soggy and smudged and streaked with ink and filled with Harry. Always Harry.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Not Language But A Map

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Fifteen Minutes](https://archiveofourown.org/works/775054) by [writeivywrite](https://archiveofourown.org/users/writeivywrite/pseuds/writeivywrite). 



> set, more or less, during the epilogue of Fifteen Minutes but could also be read as a standalone*

Zayn never realizes he’s doing it, not until he hears the  _tap tap_  of the tip of his biro against his fingernails, not until he ducks his head and finds a napkin or the back of a receipt, soggy and smudged and streaked with ink and filled with Harry. Always Harry. Harry’s clever fingers grasping at the frets of his guitar, the unruly pile of Harry’s hair that curls however impossibly even more when it’s damp, or Harry’s mouth and the way it curves ever so slightly upwards even when he isn’t smiling. And it’s not even all of Harry all at once, just bits and pieces of him here and there that Zayn finds himself committing to paper (and that one on the bathroom door in The Dublin) unconsciously and unthinkingly.

Zayn never finishes any of them once he catches himself idly doodling but what he does is balls the sketch up in his fist and pockets it for later. Later is when he’s back at his loft, does the whole song and dance of I “should just throw this away this is rubbish” and he somehow always ends up flattening out the creases of the crumpled sheet and slides it in between the pages of a book. It’s the same book that once housed the picture of Zayn’s past, of him and Adam. It’s the same book Harry— Harry, heedless and curious and just  _everywhere_  even from the start— dropped on the floor the first time they properly met. 

It’s the same book Harry’s got in his hands right now and it’s too late for Zayn to do anything but stand at the doorway and clutch the  _Target_  bag in his hand like an anchor while he watches Harry, in the middle of their pad surrounded by half unpacked boxes, thumbing through the pages the furrow of his brows deepening with each passing second. Maybe Harry hears the crinkling of plastic or the gasp Zayn thought he’d swallowed and Harry’s eyes shifts from the book to Zayn.

"Hey, you," Harry says mildly and Zayn is hit with a sense of deja vu.

"Hey. You," Zayn takes a breath, “you found my book," he finishes lamely.

Harry’s smile is playful as he pads his way, barefoot, across the room to where Zayn’s standing. 

"This is all of me, yeah?" Harry raises the hand holding the book and to Zayn, it’s like Harry’s brandishing a sword and Zayn has nothing but a flimsy grocery bag filled with a pack of cigarettes and box of nails as a shield. 

Zayn knows why he kept them. He knows why he’d never thrown a single drawing away. He wanted to keep Harry. Zayn wanted to keep the boy who shared himself so willingly to anyone and everyone, yet never ever completely and never to a single person. So Zayn filled in the gaps and drew in what Harry didn’t give, what Zayn wanted for himself, so he’d somehow have all of Harry. Zayn wants to say all of this. He wants to say how silly he was being what with Harry being here—  _finally—_ with him but as is often the case, the words get lodged in his throat and he contents himself with gnawing at the inside of his cheek, eyeing Harry warily.

But Harry’s gaze grows soft when he looks Zayn dead in the eye and the next thing Zayn knows, he’s being wrapped with a pair of arms he’s grown to know and he smells his,  _their_ , shampoo when he inhales the familiar mop of curls tickling his nose. Harry holds him a beat longer than he’s used, tighter than normal with his fingers digging into Zayn’s shoulders. This is a language Zayn understands, a language he understands the most, and his heart is singing because somewhere along the way, Harry ended up learning how a touch could mean  _I miss you_ or how a light punch to the chest means  _be careful_ and this right now is Harry saying  _I’m here. I’m here and I’m here to stay._

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> The image of Zayn drawing Harry all the time kept persisting and persisting in my head after reading Ivy's fic, and before I knew it I was halfway into writing this. Title from Jack Gilbert's _The Forgotten Dialect of the Heart_.
> 
> Originally posted and written on a reblogged Tumblr post about a month ago under the username okaysurewhynot. I've changed my url to vicepresidents since then and you're very much welcome to say hi over there!
> 
> * this could be taken out of the context in the Fifteen Minutes universe but a) I highly doubt anyone in this fandom has yet to read it; b) why would anyone _want_ to do that anyway


End file.
